The charade continues. On Monday, the House Intelligence Committee held its first public hearing with FBI director James Comey to investigate the Trump campaign’s alleged connections to Russia and the role Russia played in “stealing” the United States’ presidential elections.
Comey confirmed what everyone already knew, that the FBI is actively continuing to probe Donald Trump’s campaign aides and their alleged collusion with the Russian government to rig the election. Not a shred of real evidence was presented during the hearing.
The Democratic Party brass miscalculated their own party’s and candidate’s unpopularity, leading to their humiliating loss in the 2016 election. Confronted with their complete failure to win over large sections of their traditional base, the Democrats have opted to blame Russia.
After the hearings, Democratic National Committee Senior Adviser Zac Petkanas stated: “We need a real independent investigation and to raise serious questions about why the Trump team was in communication with foreign individuals under FISA warrant. It’s time for an independent 9/11 style commission and a special prosecutor. Now.”
The liberal wing of the ruling class may never have to prove any actual collusion with Russia. The allegations and investigations alone serve the dual purpose of giving them cover for their electoral defeat and reducing the likelihood that the Trump administration will stray from the path of ever-heightening confrontation with Russia. Trump has already sought to appease the liberals and has begun to back away from his initial plans to seek a limited partnership with Russia.
Infighting among the elite
It is important to clarify that the disagreements over how to deal with Russia in the ruling summits of the U.S. capitalist class are about profits and geopolitical strategy. Neither side is a friend of Russia or any other country. As Henry Kissinger said, “in politics there are no permanent friends, there are only permanent interests.”
Trump’s attacks on major global actors, such as China, Iran and others, and his withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and other trade deals, represents the potential loss of global markets, trade deals and super profits. If Trump follows through with his campaign promise of penalizing big capital for producing overseas and being “unpatriotic,” he will continue on a collision course with a big section of the ruling class.
For this reason, and not because of any secret relationship with Russia, Trump has incurred the wrath of powerful political foes. The narcissistic, unpredictable and inexperienced Trump potentially destabilizes their economic interests.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer insisted: “It is unseemly to be moving forward so fast on confirming a Supreme Court justice with a lifetime appointment, while this big gray cloud of an FBI investigation hangs over the presidency.”
In response to the loose allegations that have been repeated ad nauseam since Trump scored more electoral votes than Hillary Clinton, Republicans sought to deflect attention away from the investigation by demanding that criminal charges be brought against any political insider who has leaked sensitive information to the media.
Liberal media coverage following Trump’s electoral victory has been one non-stop avalanche of anti-Russian propaganda. CNN, MSNBC, the New York Times, Washington Post and other mainstream liberal media outlets have run thousands of stories about the “Russian election attack.” Even “progressive” Democrats, like civil rights icon Georgia Congressman John Lewis and California Representative Maxine Waters, have parroted the tall tale of a Russian hand behind everything that has gone wrong in the United States since the election.
The claim that Russia poses an existential threat to the security of the people of the United States is absurd. Russia’s military might is a fraction of that of the Pentagon. According to both the Stockholm Peace Research Initiative and the International Institute for Strategic Studies, Russia’s military is about 1/10th the size of the United States’. Saudi Arabia, one of main U.S. client regimes in the Middle East, has a larger military than Russia. The United States and NATO have military bases in Georgia, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania and other countries that surround Russia and they constantly look to push further eastward.
The real enemy is the ruling class
This barrage of Russophobic propaganda is a distraction away from the real issues.
Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have an answer for the widespread poverty, unemployment, opioid addiction and other social woes afflicting working-class America. Both parties represent big money. Together in the 2016 presidential race, the Democrats and Republics received $2.4 billion dollars in campaign donations from corporations and banks.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation is clear that Russia is not the enemy—a system based on the hoarding of society’s wealth is. Organize and mobilize with us as we continue to build an alternative power that can oppose and overthrow Trump and the entire decrepit system that put him into power!
